Saturday, February 17, 2007

Meet my mama.

I'm pretty libertarian in my views, and for the most part feel that we're making a serious mistake in the manner we are using to deal with drugs in this country. More jail time, and serious prison time, for mere possession is a stupid way to handle things. It costs between $30,000 and $40,000 a year to house a prisoner. Given the prolific numbers of people on drugs that that are consider a felony simply to possess, that means that proper implementation of the laws that we have on the books will bankrupt us.

There's the notable inconsistency of drug laws. While I've had to deal with many an irate, fighting drunk, I've yet to find a pothead who wants to settle things with fistifuffs. Chips and dip, perhaps. Nachos and guacamole, maybe. But not by fighting. But even a single marijuana cigarette in your own living room is cause for an on view arrest for a jail stay of up to 180 days. The same adult can drive into a bar and drink until they close at 2:00, and then drive home if he's able. (5 hours after the liquor stores are required to close. I never understood that part. You can buy a hard drink at a bar or club, but you can't buy a bottle to take home an drink responsibly.) As Tamara refers to it, our war on drugs is really "The War On (Some) Drugs."

But then there's my good friend LawDog's point of view. LawDog is a close personal friend, and I have much respect for him. But we have a slight disagreement on the drug issue, in some areas. LD wants, last time we discussed the issue, our drug laws enforced STRONGLY. He, as I, have seen many problems directly attributable to people's addiction to and abuse of drugs of all kind. LawDog is a thinker who is blessed not to have an addictive personality. He doesn't smoke, and drinks but very lightly, if at all. He is weight proportionate.

I don't know if I have an "addictive" personality. I think I probably have a "habit-forming" personality. I never did use drugs. I never smoked. They never made sense to me. I do eat too much, and I suspect that I could develop an unfortunate habit to drink too much for the same reason-- I love the taste. For those reasons, I monitor my intake of foods and strong drink, keeping my weight below 300 and beers below a case a month. Not huge accomplishments, and I don't bother to put them on my resume', to be sure.

My point (I had one around here) is that there's lots of views on this drug thing, and sometimes they're polar opposites, even though they're from intelligent people that I like and respect. Or, in the case of my Mama, love dearly.

All I ask, here, is that we all take into account the validity of the arguments of those whom we've granted rights to have a say in things. Tamara is desperately trying to prevent and draw attention to the erosion of our civil liberties, for questionable reasons and with often tragic results. LawDog is often trying, with humor, to point out the regular trainwrecks that results from those who abuse substances that often literally have no recognizably good use. And Mom points out that there are many ("they are legion") who are abusing drugs to the extreme detriment of those who never had the chance to make a choice in the matter.

When making decisions about how you feel on the drug issue, remember that addicts don't get better by going to prison. Remember that addicts that are free and untreated commit crimes. Remember that when you violate an addict's right you are violating the rights of yourself and your loved ones. And remember that the children of addicts always suffer.

1 Comments:

I have heard somewhere that most of the drug laws on weed are buried in treaties somewhere. One reason people do what they do is they know that the first several times the response will be a slap on the wrist. If the pnishment is certain, immediate, and memorable, people simply will stop because the price is to high. People speed to the point the LEO allows (+10), push it back to the actual limit,people will howl, but comply.The example group are going to suffer, for sure.